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Jewishhistorydotorg mounted a revolt against the absentee Polish landlords who controlled Ukraine. Since the Polish landlords were absentee, they weren't there to run their farms or businesses, so they hired Jews to do so. That put the Jews in a very delicate and unfavorable position. Nobody likes to pay rent, nobody likes to pay debts, and nobody likes when somebody comes to collect. Therefore, among the Ukrainians and the Poles, there was resentment against the Jews.
Khmelnytsky, in his rebellion against the Polish landlords, against the Polish army, and eventually against the Russian army, found that if you have to fight an army, it is dangerous, but if you can kill defenseless Jews, it is not so dangerous. Therefore, in the years 1648 and 1649, Khmelnytsky and his forces slaughtered over 250,000 Jews in Eastern Europe. They caused hundreds of thousands of others to become refugees. The Jewish infrastructure in Eastern Europe was destroyed, the great rabbis had to go into exile, and entire communities disappeared. It would take 100 to 150 years to attempt to rebuild, and it never came back to the glory it once was.
Khmelnytsky himself died in 1653. He is treated in Ukraine as a hero; in Kiev there is an enormous statue of him riding on a horse, triumphantly. As we all know, in the world one man's hero is somebody else's villain. The Jewish people certainly do not think of him as a hero. We think of him as a wanted murderer. He fed upon the anti-Semitism that was always present, and upon the religious anti-Semitism that was certainly present in the 17th century, and it is present all over and today unfortunately as well.
This tremendous disaster destroyed Jewish communities in Ukraine, Poland, and Lithuania. It reached as far north as Lithuania. It is seen as a watershed in Jewish life. For 400 years, Jews had been in Poland and Eastern Europe, and everything was wonderful: they had good jobs, autonomy and self-government, and the Polish kings promised to protect them. Then, all of a sudden, it all went up in flames. That was a bitter lesson, and because of it, great changes came upon the Jewish world in this 17th century, changes that have lasted until now, into the 21st century. The effects are still felt in the Jewish world and in the general world as well.
Thank you for watching. My name is Basil Wein. For more on Jewish history, go to jewishhistorydotorg.